Then, Ener1, a manufacturer of batteries for electric vehicles and recipient of Stimulus largesse, filed for bankruptcy.

And [Friday], the Las Vegas Sun report[ed] that Amonix, Inc., a manufacturer of solar panels that received $5.9 million from the Porkulus, will cut two-thirds of its workforce, about 200 employees, only seven months after opening a factory in Nevada.

.... There is a parable at the end of the Sermon on the Mount that tells the story of two men. The first built his house on a pile of sand, and it was destroyed as soon as the storm hit. But the second is known as the wise man, for when "...the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house...it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock."

We cannot rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand. We must build our house upon a rock. We must lay a new foundation for growth and prosperity - a foundation that will move us from an era of borrow and spend to one where we save and invest; where we consume less at home and send more exports abroad.

It's a foundation built upon five pillars [ * ] that will grow our economy and make this new century another American century:

new rules for Wall Street that will reward drive and innovation;

new investments in education that will make our workforce more skilled and competitive;

new investments in renewable energy and technology that will create new jobs and industries;

new investments in health care that will cut costs for families and businesses; and

new savings in our federal budget that will bring down the debt for future generations.

That is the new foundation we must build. That must be our future - and my Administration's policies are designed to achieve that future."

Nearly three years later it is worth examining how his pillars have fared.

New Rules?

New investments?

New savings in our federal budget to bring down the debt? A foundation "that will move us from an era of borrow and spend to one where we save and invest"?

Eh... not so much.

How far we have come! In just three years, the pile of sand has run out, the pillars have crumbled, the foundation has cracked.

The survey also found that Israeli Jews view religious ceremonies as important milestones.

94% said so about circumcision,

92% about the seven days of mourning after a relative's death,

91% about the bar mitzvah ceremony,

90% about saying the Kaddish prayer over deceased parents,

86% about Jewish burial, and

83% about the bat mitzvah ceremony.

While less than a majority of Israeli Jews observe Shabbat fully, a great number celebrate Shabbat in some way:

84% spend time with their family,

69% hold a special meal,

66% light candles and

60% say the Kiddush prayer.

On the other hand, 65% watch television or listen to the radio on the day of rest, and 52% surf the Internet. Thirty-seven percent engage in sports activities or go to the beach, 29% eat out, 16% go shopping and 11% work.

That the attack on Newt’s Reagan bona fides came from someone who openly ran against Reaganism and against the conservative agenda in 1994 was an irony lost only on the pro-Romney Republican establishment and media."

Todah RABAH to Wiliam A. Jacobson for being willing - and so very able - to put this mess into words. I urge you to read it all - at Legal Insurrection:

If you asked me even a couple of weeks ago whether the Republican Party could heal from the wounds of this election cycle in time to unite against Obama, I would have said ”Yes.”

I’m not so sure anymore. After the South Carolina primary the Republican establishment, and media supporters like Matt Drudge, launched Scorched Earth II on Newt, while pro-Romney pundits like Ann Coulter heaped scorn on the conservative and Tea Party voters who sided with Newt.

It may just be “not-beanbag” to the Romney campaign and its supporters, but people hear them loud and clear.

Two lines of attack have exposed a schism between the Republican political haves and have nots which will not easily heal: The attempt to rewrite the history of the Reagan revolution and the embrace of Nancy Pelosi’s partisan ethics attack and blackmail.

As to Reagan, I have documented many times here how the story line espoused by the Romney campaign and its supporters was false. Newt was an important part of the Reagan revolution, and was not anti-Reagan as various pro-Romney pundits claimed.

This line of attack on Newt was pushed by Drudge even as the individual charges highlighted at the top of Drudge were disproved one by one.

There was a backlash on Thursday and Friday among talk radio hosts and a variety of people who were in a first hand position to observe Newt’s interaction with Reagan, culminating in Sarah Palin’s Facebook post on Friday afternoon denouncing the neo-Stalinist attempt to rewrite history.

That the attack on Newt’s Reagan bona fides came from someone who openly ran against Reaganism and against the conservative agenda in 1994 was an irony lost only on the pro-Romney Republican establishment and media.

Romney’s attacks on Newt’s late 1990s ethics charge also were distinctly from the left, echoing the talking points of anti-conservative Democrats like Nancy Pelosi. It took people like Byron York and Mark Levin to expose the truth that the charges were part of a Democratic Party vendetta, and that substantively Newt did nothing wrong and was vindicated.

But mostly, the Republican establishment and conservative media who howled with outrage when Newt and Rick Perry were seen (wrongly in my view) as attacking Romney “from the left” were silent, even as the Romney camp openly embraced Nancy Pelosi’s blackmail and ran ads featuring Pelosi threatening to reveal secret information about Newt after Pelosi already had backed away from the threat.

The embrace of Nancy Pelosi by the Romney campaign should have met with an avalanche of criticism from the Republican establishment, but almost nothing was said.

Romney is back at it in Florida, with a last minute and massive ad buy running a clip of Tom Brokaw from 1997 about Newt’s plea to a single ethics charge. Romney not only attacked Newt again from the left in the spirit of Pelosi, but did so using a mainstream news media figure from a network notoriously hostile to conservatives. Yet again, near silence from the Republican establishment and conservative media.

As Palin pointed out, this no longer is about Romney and Newt. It’s a schism between the Republican political haves and have nots, with the have nots furious at the double standard applied to their candidate by the political haves.

The schism need not have occurred. It entirely is an outgrowth of the way in which the Romney campaign and Republican political and media establishments have conducted themselves.

Friday, 27 January 2012

.... This quote from Levin probably sums up his point about Newt more than anything else:

“Newt Gingrich, if he does nothing else, did more for the conservative movement and to stop the liberal Democrats in the House of Representatives than virtually everybody today who is criticizing him!”

He also plays the full audio in context, of the so-called Reagan-bashing that Newt did back in 1988, that absolutely disproves the idea that Newt was bashing Reagan at all.